Lottery game tickets are frequently sold in retail establishments such as convenience stores, liquor stores, and the like. These and other establishments selling lottery tickets are sensitive to the costs of counter space used, and labor required in the sale and redemption of lottery tickets. Some lottery customers do not want to wait for a weekly or daily drawing. These customers may purchase “instant-win” lottery tickets. Such tickets may also involve games, such as lotto, battleship, bingo, or other games that increase customer interest and enjoyment in the purchase of such tickets. Instant-win lottery tickets are generally sold to retailers in pre-printed books or bundles. A pre-printed ticket may have a printed indicia or message indicating the ticket is a winner and/or the prize amount, as well as human or machine-readable codes for authenticating winning tickets. These indicia, messages, and codes may be hidden, e.g., with a peel-off or scratch-off coating. Commonly, whether an instant-win ticket is a winner is predetermined prior to the sale of the ticket. Examples of instant win tickets involving card games are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,250,685, 6,206,780, and 6,168,521.
Instant-win games differ from pooled drawing games, where a lottery ticket represents a chance in a drawing to be held at some later time for a pooled prize or prizes. Rather, in an instant-win game, whether the ticket is a winner is determined at or before the time the ticket is purchased, although whether the ticket is actually a winner may be concealed from the buyer and seller. Instant-win games may include “extended play” features such as games printed on the ticket, e.g., bingo or number matching. These features may increase the enjoyment and interest level of purchasers of such tickets, causing them to buy tickets in greater numbers or more frequently.
In addition to instant-win tickets some retail establishments, such as bars, restaurants or delicatessens, may offer traditional lottery games or Keno. In a traditional lottery game a ticket is purchased, numbers are randomly drawn and the ticket is matched against the numbers drawn to determine whether the ticket is a winning ticket. Keno is similar to a traditional lottery game where a customer picks numbers and then matches those numbers to a second set of drawn numbers to determine if the ticket is a winning ticket. However, Keno drawings occur more frequently than the traditionally lottery drawings, once every 10 or 15 minutes, thus offering customers a more frequent opportunity to play than traditionally lottery drawings. In Keno and traditional lottery drawings whether the ticket is a winning ticket is not determined prior to the sale of the ticket.